This invention relates generally to computer software, and more specifically to a system and method for allowing an application program to integrate and/or synchronize with a computer directory.
Some computer software applications attempt to provide a bi-directional data sharing service to distribute new and updated information across directories, databases and critical applications on a network and across firewalls to partner systems. These applications often attempt to achieve uniform data integrity and automated efficiency by helping to eliminate the manual and repetitive tasks of creating and modifying user identities in all the different systems and applications within your enterprise and partner systems. The applications can make automatic change on business rules and can preserve authoritative data sources. An example such a software application is a software product called DirXML 1.0, which is provided by Novell, Inc. of Provo, Utah. A more detailed description of DirXML 1.0, as it pertains to the present embodiment herein discussed, is provided in U.S. Ser. No. 09/470,645, which is presently incorporated by reference.
A typical application configuration mixes policy, the data driven by the policy, the logic that selects a policy for a given user, and the logic that implements the policy in a target system. For example, an enterprise such as a large company can have different policies for different employees. Certain employees may be grouped into predetermined email and/or voicemail distribution groups, can be given access to certain buildings and/or laboratories, can be set to a defined pay scale, and so forth.
The target system becomes very large, and it is often difficult to maintain templates scattered throughout the configuration. Furthermore, a user of such an application is often required to have advanced skills in application tools (such as an extensible markup language—XML) and overall policy for the enterprise.